ashes, ashes, we all fall down
by Cerulean Pen
Summary: she hides in their shadows for warmth…/cat losing breaths day by day. beckcat.


ashes, ashes, we all fall down

Summary: she hides in their shadows for warmth…/cat losing breaths day by day. beckcat.

English Angst/Romance Rated: T Chapters:1 Words: Cat V. & Beck O.

**a/n: **ignore this terrible gibberish, wanted to throw a cat one-shot into the pond to get it out of my system, been bugging me for hours. excuse all terribleness, written at one in the morning when supposed to be asleep. leave a review, flames excepted.

**the first time is always the hardest.**

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it's not like she plans to cut through. cat simply presses the blade against her flesh, watching it slowly fade to pink, enthralled by the process. **blade, **_skin, _p i n k . she never can quite remember that razors slice through skin, and she's always so shocked when red velvet cupcake _(oh right, blood) _leaks. cat doesn't plan to cut through. but she welcomes it.

cat knows how it starts. she's lying on the floor, using a familiar plaid shirt as a pillow, listening to him hum under his breath _(-she breathes softly, in out in out in out, scared to frighten him). _the thought of being caught by jade jar her, her polished fingernails ripping tears from her eyes and her bowed lips screaming insults and words that make her quiver. but she's never been brave.

he bends down to lift a lock of her hair up, smiling and saying _"hi" _like she hasn't been here the entire time. there's something so _ohperfectlyperfect _about beck that makes cat want to touch him, to hold his gorgeous hands, to look into his amazing eyes, to borrow his strength because she has none of her own. when you're not perfect, it's nice to be around someone who is.

and the rest of the night simply diminishes behind closed eyelids, lost to a unmade bed and a tangle of fingers. as cat shrieks from the body attempting to break into hers, she can feel the curves where jade has been in her place.

_(cat is just a replacement. but it feels good to be one.)_

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shadows are easy to slip into. the chilly darkness can consume cat whole, so that she disappears from view, and jade can never see her staring at beck longingly. there are so many of them, prettyprettypretty tori and andre laughing and rex 'cause robbie hasn't the nerve to talk and perfectly messed-up jade and beck. cat doesn't have the right words for him.

cat conceals herself in their silhouettes, locked tight from a world that believes she's crazy and she has the scars to prove it. on the jade-shaped bed though, she can melt into beck. she'll never be her own person. she's just caterina valentine, insane and red and forced smiles after she swallows her fears.

"do you ever wish to be someone else?" she asks as they lay in the darkness, cat with a terrible taste in her mouth that reminds her of the m e s s she made.

"no, but i wished to be somewhere else."

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_(on a Thursday, he gets rid of his old sheets, and when cat sits down, she finds blue instead of red, nylon instead of polyester, cat-shaped instead of jade-shaped._

_he stands, doesn't sit, and tells her in one sentence "cat i'm breaking up with you" and she just looks at his hands when he talks. all the warmth they shared and knows why he was able to choke out those six words. she wishes she hadn't said "i love you" last night. he has enough love already; he just wants reassurance that he can still hold onto it._

_"beck are you home?"_

_she storms into the rv with her eyeliner smudged and her boots clack against the floor while cat's shoes just make soft "shush" noises. "beck you said you'd get rid of her by seven"_

_eyes lock on hers. "you can-"_

_cat leaves, finds his old blankets in the trashcan, and takes them home. she doesn't wash them or lay them with her own. she burns the sheets and watches the pretty flames dance over the fabric, incinerating her mistakes and desires-_

_and her prettyperfect beck._

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somehow tori finds out, and she's at the door a quarter to seven, all cheekbones and white teeth, like a walking vogue magazine. no one's home, so cat invites her in, pours glasses of pink lemonade, pretending that this is a normal visit. _(with her there is only a b n o r m a l.) _her lipstick leaves a flawless glittering pink crescent on the glass, and she shakes her head.

_"beck left you for jade," _she murmurs like it was all a big surprise, but cat knew it was going to happen, a movie that someone spoiled for you and you know the ending when you watch it. their lives were all a soap opera based on fairytales, where the prince always gets the princess. **always.**

_"it's not so bad," _cat lies, and smiles, even though it makes her ribs hurt and oxygen escapes her. they expect her to be jovial little cat, happy and cheerful and full of her odd stories that will cause her to burst if she doesn't share. cat who can pick herself up after a blow. cat who doesn't need romance. cat who has no problems of her own.

_"won't you excuse me?" _she asks, and runs to the bathroom, and throws up her pink lemonade. the flavor it leaves reminds her of those nights in the rv, knowing everything she did was wrong. cat lays on the floor, and waits for tori to leave. when she does, cat picks up her razor, the gorgeous blades glinting in the fluorescent lighting.

the first cut comes naturally, like she's a pro, a sheet of her skin, part of her body, floating to the floor like a cloud. it's then when she beams for real, and is enveloped by a strange tingling feeling that numbs her whole body. blood drips down her paper skin, droplets forming the perfect heart on the cold white tiles.

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_(ow.)_

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when she's not daring the razor to sink into her skin, she's cutting up what's left us beck. it almost feels like she and jade have switched places. jade gets beck every night; cat gets pain and scissors. in fact, it's so funny, that when cat finally figures it out, she has to lock herself in the bathroom and laugh so she won't wake anyone up. they won't care though. even if her parents here, they'll ignore it.

first there's receipts from gifts he bought her, the printed numbers and amounts and insignias floating into her trashcans. there are post-it notes and letters and messages passed in class, and her room looks like a blizzard went through it.

cat's not very careful with the scissors, and she's left with the pads of her fingers bleeding. it never occurs to her this is dangerous. to the cat everyone else knows, she knows no danger or pain or sorrow. she's sunny, giggling cat.

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she lays in bed and thinks she dead some nights, barely clinging to life, and the only way to convince herself is to listen for her heartbeat _(she forgets to breathe.) _people who go crazy often pretend their dead, and for cat, it's just another game, a trivial little imaginative amusement that the other cat would do. feel her heart steadily releasing blood throughout her body that rarely makes it back to the heart before cat split's a blood vessel.

maybe she is insane. maybe hurting yourself isn't a normal thing. maybe thinking that you're two people is "different." but that would just be giving up. and cat is waiting for the right moment to give up.

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it's breaking and entering, but cat manages to crawl into beck's bathroom window, huddled in the shower and listening to the mattress creak in the next room. it's thursday and there's class tomorrow. cat knows this; she wants beck and jade to tell everyone immediately what they find. she pats her skirt pocket. it's still there.

_i'm not crazy. _she slashes her stomach, the delicate flesh splitting down the middle. _beck used to be mine. _the blade moves gently down her arm, peeling back to allow rivulets of blood to stain his floor. _i can never be perfect. _her long thin legs rip like spider webs. there are plenty more reasons, but the razor suddenly weighs a million pounds, and cat can't lift it.

fireworks explode just for her on the back of her eyelids. she loves the irony of how she ends where it all begins.

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**the last time is always the easiest.**


End file.
